I am a Thinking Thing. ’Tis True; for because I think or have a Phantasme (whether I am awake or asleep) it follows that I am Thinking, for I Think and I am Thinking signifie the same Thing. Because I Think, it follows That I am, for whatever Thinks cannot be Nothing. But when he Adds, That is, a Mind, a Soul, an Understanding, Reason, I question his Argumentation; for it does not seem a Right Consequence to say, I am a Thinking Thing, therefore I am a Thought, neither, I am an Understanding Thing, therefore I am the Understanding. For in the same manner I may Conclude, I am a Walking Thing, therefore I am the Walking it self.
Wherefore D.Cartes Concludes that an Understanding Thing and Intellection (which is the Act of an Understanding Thing) are the same; or at least that an Understanding Thing and the Intellect (which is the Power of an Understanding Thing) are the same; And yet all Philosophers distinguish the subject from its Faculties and Acts, that is, from its Properties and Essence, for the Thing it self is one thing, and its Essence is an other. It may be therefore that a Thinking Thing is the Subject of a Mind, Reason, or Understanding, and therefor it may be a Corporeal Thing, the Contrary Whereof is here Assumed and not Proved; and yet this Inference is the Foundation of that Conclusion which D.Cartes would Establish.
* Places noted with this Asterick are the Passages of the foregoing Meditations here Objected against.
In the same Meditation, on, * I know that I am, I ask, What I am Whom I Thus Know, Certainly the Knowledge of Me precisely so taken depends not on those Things of whose Existence I am yet Ignorant.
’Tis Certain the Knowledge of this Proposition I am, depends on this, I think as he hath rightly inform’d us; but from whence have we the knowledge of this Proposition, I think? certainly from hence only, that we cannot conceive any Act without its subject, as dancing without a Dancer, knowledge, without a Knower, thought without a thinker.
And from hence it seems to follow, that a thinking Thing is a Corporeal Thing; for the Subjects of all Acts are understood only in a Corporeal way, or after the manner of matter, as he himself shews hereafter by the example of a piece of Wax, which changing its colour, consistence, shape, and other Acts is yet known to continue the same thing, that is, the same matter subject to so many changes. But I cannot conclude from another thought that I now think; for tho a Man may think that he hath thought (which consists only in memory) yet ’tis altogether impossible for him to think that he now thinks, or to know, that he knows, for the question may be put infinitely, how do you know that you know, that you know, that you know? &c.
Wherefore seeing the Knowledge of this Proposition I am, depends on the knowledge of this I think, and the knowledge of this is from hence only, that we cannot separate thought from thinking matter, it seems rather to follow, that a thinking thing is material, than that ’tis immaterial.
ANSWER.
When I said, That is a Mind, a Soul, an Understanding, Reason, &c. I did not mean by these names the Faculties only, but the things indow’d with those Faculties; and so ’tis alwayes understood by the two first names (mind and soul) and very often so understood by the two last Names (understanding and Reason) and this I have explain’d so often, and in so many places of these Meditations, that there is not the least occasion of questioning my meaning.
Neither is there any parity between Walking and Thought, for walking is used only for the Act it self, but thought is sometimes used for the Act, sometimes for the Faculty, and sometimes for the thing it self, wherein the Faculty resides.